


and then i was a careless fool (and i fell in love with you)

by choerryonce



Category: Red White & Royal Blue - Casey McQuiston
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Fluff, M/M, One Shot, Sharing a Bed, alex and henry are idiots, alternating povs, i love these two more than anything in the world, if it's bad im so sorry, june and nora being literally the best people in the world, nora holleran marry me, please im begging, this is my first fic for them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-17 06:07:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29588361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/choerryonce/pseuds/choerryonce
Summary: “What a peculiar thing. He’s been in love with Alex since they were kids. Strangely, madly in love. He doesn’t even really know why -- he was just always drawn to Alex. Alex was everything he wished he could be. He was open, funny, witty, thoughtful. He was so alive and happy. He lived in a dimension Henry could never access. Henry was restricted to subtle flattery and ballroom dancing.Of course, it was never going to happen. For one, Alex was straight, and for two, as previously mentioned, Henry was a member of the royal fucking family, and being gay was a bit of a no-go.But now, here he is, with Alex as his soulmate. That’s a plot twist if he ever saw one coming.”or a firstprince soulmate/sharing a bed au that no one asked for but we all neededthis is gifted to one of my best friends in the world for her birthday! i love you so much
Relationships: Alex Claremont-Diaz/Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor
Comments: 18
Kudos: 87





	and then i was a careless fool (and i fell in love with you)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [moresapphicbookspls](https://archiveofourown.org/users/moresapphicbookspls/gifts).



> a/n: hi everyone! i'm back. i'm super late on my other projects but for now, you get this cute little firstprince oneshot that i have written for my best friend's birthday. she's moresapphicbookspls on ao3! go check out her lovely account. i love you so much, i can't believe it's been seven years since we first met <3 happy birthday!!
> 
> enjoy!
> 
> \- margot

When the words appeared on Alex Gabriel Claremont-Diaz’s wrist the morning of his 10th birthday, he thought the whole thing was pretty fucking cool. 

“Alex. I wondered if I’d have the pleasure.” Swift cursive handwriting. Inky black text. The way it was written, though, made it seem almost… sarcastic? What, was his soulmate not going to like him? That didn’t make sense.

It was his 10th birthday, March 27. He was at the lake house, off from school. He had barely gotten to sleep the night before.

Soulmates. A heavy topic. A loaded word. Little Alex didn’t really understand the full concept yet. 

Once it turns midnight on your 10th birthday, the first words your soulmate will say to you appear on your wrist; but not just the first words ever. Even if you know the person already, the words on your wrist might not be the first thing they ever said to you -- no, these are the first words they will say when your love story begins. When you start going down the path that will eventually lead to a romance.

Usually. Sometimes soulmates die. Sometimes you never get a mark. And sometimes you never end up in a relationship, and the soulmark disappears. But those were all rare, and Alex didn’t think he had to worry about them. (Spoiler alert: he didn’t. His soulmate story was mostly normal. Mostly.)

Anyway, without letting his mind take control too much, he sat there, on the edge of the lake, staring at his wrist, running the words over with his hands, fingers dancing across the letters. Amazing. He actually had a soulmate. He really, truly, had a soulmate. 

\--------

On March 12, a little over a year before Alex got his soulmark, a certain young Prince Henry George Edward James Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor got his own. He couldn’t really care less. (He did, a bit, though.)

He knew he was gay. He had just learned what that term meant, and when he looked up the definition, young Henry thought, oh. 

Oh. 

Yeah. Oh. 

So he figured a real romance wasn’t in the storybooks for him anyway; he would grow up, meet a perfectly respectable girl who came from nobility, strike up a friendship, and eventually get married because, well, that’s what you do when you’re in the royal family.

His soulmate was probably a boy. And royals didn’t marry other boys. Maybe he wasn’t gay, though, and he could have a nice typical soulmate romance; you meet your soulmate, realize that they just said the words on your wrist, and fall in love, etc etc. 

He probably was gay, though.

Anyways, you’re almost certainly wondering what his soulmark was. It was a long one, too -- the print was small and he nearly had to squint; it barely fit on his wrist. “When you have one of these, you should do two champagne fountains instead of one. Really embarrassing to be at a wedding with only one champagne fountain.”

It was quite a bit of information. A) he would start his “soulmate journey,” as the books liked to call it, when he was able to drink champagne, so 18 or older. B) it would be at a wedding. That didn’t particularly narrow things down, though, since he was 10 years old and had already attended far too many weddings for him to count. That’s what happens when you are in the royal family. So many things happen when you’re in the royal family. Sometimes Henry wondered what it would be like to just be a normal person.

And he’s still wondering that now.

\--------

Ah, Prince Phillip’s wedding. That prick.

Or at least, Alex assumes he’s a prick. He assumes every member of the royal family is a prick, actually, and most of all, Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor.

Fucking hell, that name is a mouthful. Such a confusing name for such a bland person. Blond white guys are so goddamn bland. It’s like nothing on nothing. Beige on beige. At least have the audacity to have brown hair or something.

If Alex thinks about it, he doesn’t really know why he hates Henry. He just knows that he does; he always has. Henry deserves to be hated, and that’s that. He’s so boring and polite, doing generic charity appearances and being chivalrous to whatever girl he’s dating at the moment.

Alex believes himself to be much more interesting. He makes jokes, works hard, gives thoughtful answers to interview questions. He was on the cover of GQ at eighteen. He wants to go into politics. He’s so much more interesting than some blond white guy whose favorite hobby is horseback riding. 

But while weddings are boring, and especially royal weddings are boring, there is a lot of food. And a lot to make fun of. Those are two of Alex’s favorite things. There’s a $75,000 wedding cake that is waiting to be eaten -- how can Alex pass up that opportunity?

After discussing sex waifs at length with Nora, Alex finally sees Henry from across the room. He is, as always, infuriatingly handsome. His sandy hair is all tousled and his cheekbones are high and he holds himself with fucking terrific posture. He’s holding a glass of champagne and hovering near the cake and the champagne fountain, watching Prince Phillip and his bride dance together.

Alex hates him. And so, he has to go annoy him. 

He strides across the room, grabbing a glass of wine off a tray and downing half of it in the process. When he sidles up to Henry, leaning slightly into his ear, he says, “When you have one of these, you should do two champagne fountains instead of one. Really embarrassing to be at a wedding with only one champagne fountain.”

Henry responds, without looking at him, with, “Alex. I wondered if I’d have the pleasure.”

Then Henry’s face turns towards his and he looks like something has just clicked in his brain because his eyes are all wide and his cheeks are all red and Alex wonders what it could be and then his wrist tingles and Alex is sure that his own eyes are all wide and his own cheeks are all red because the same thing has just clicked in his brain and-

Holy. Fucking. Shit.

\--------

Henry is pretty sure that his brain glitches out or something because there is no fucking way in hell that Alex just said those words to him. But he looks down at his wrist and what-ho, there they are. Shit. Shit shit shit.

God, this is bad. Very, very bad.

So. 

Alex Claremont-Diaz is his soulmate. That’s some food for thought.

Henry wonders briefly about the statistical probability of being soulmates with someone you’re already in love with because he believes that is what has just happened. Because he is. In love with Alex, he means.

What a peculiar thing. He’s been in love with Alex since they were kids. Strangely, madly in love. He doesn’t even really know why -- he was just always drawn to Alex. Alex was everything he wished he could be. He was open, funny, witty, thoughtful. He was so alive and happy. He lived in a dimension Henry could never access. Henry was restricted to subtle flattery and ballroom dancing. 

Of course, it was never going to happen. For one, Alex was straight, and for two, as previously mentioned, Henry was a member of the royal fucking family, and being gay was a bit of a no-go.

But now, here he is, with Alex as his soulmate. That’s a plot twist if he ever saw one coming. 

Judging by the look on his face, Alex is equally not-thrilled with this situation. It complicates things. Quite a bit. Alex looks away, a blush on his face.

“So… um,” Alex starts.

Henry finishes the sentence for him. “We’re soulmates.” He’s breathless, running a hand through his hair. Henry glances around the room briefly, and can only see Nora looking at them strangely (shit) but fortunately, nobody else has seemed to notice the clusterfuck Alex and Henry have found themselves in. 

Henry looks back at Alex and locks eyes with him. Alex holds eye contact for a couple of seconds before doing something Henry has not anticipated: he breaks into laughter. Gut-wrenching, stomach-aching laughter. 

Alex laughs. And laughs. And laughs. Until it seems he can’t laugh any longer. Henry watches him the whole time, lips pressed into a thin line, cautiously checking the surroundings to see what other people are doing. Nora is watching them curiously, and June is with her. Other people are sneaking the occasional glances, but nothing too big. He and Alex are known to argue and Alex is known to make fun of him. This is nothing unordinary. 

Except that this is completely not fucking ordinary. 

Once Alex comes up for air, he looks at Henry with a half-amused, half-incredulous expression, and says, “I’m sorry it’s just…” Alex wheezes again. “This is so funny.”

“Is it?” Henry is beginning to get angry.

“Yeah, I mean,” Alex continues. “It kind of is.”

“I wish it could be funny for me,” Henry says, and then turns on his heel and starts to back away from him and into the restroom. 

“No, Henry-” Alex rushes after him, but Henry saw him down that glass of wine, and Alex’s slight buzz causes him to veer off course and he careens straight into the $75,000 wedding cake. The cake tumbles off of the table and Alex falls with it. 

Henry wishes he could laugh. He wishes he could savor this moment (not least because of how fucking gorgeous Alex looks right now, by the way), but he can’t. He frowns a bit at the scene, sighs, and tilts his head back as he heads for the bathroom to collect his thoughts. 

\--------

On the car ride home from Phillip’s wedding, Alex is still brushing frosting out of his hair. 

But he doesn’t really care about that. No, he doesn’t care about that at all. 

Now that he has recovered, he is confronted with the reality that Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Fucking-Windsor is his soulmate.

His archnemesis, as June likes to call him, is his soulmate. 

And before he can question all the tricky logistics of it (isn’t he straight? Henry’s a royal? How is that going to fucking work?), there is one question that clouds his mind above all.

Fucking HOW?

How is this very boring white guy his soulmate? How is a member of the royal family his soulmate? They’re all so boring? What the fuck is happening?

But before he can properly figure that out, Nora interrupts his thoughts from beside him. 

“So,” she begins, “what the living fuck was that about?”

“Will you laugh if I tell you?”

“Probably,” Nora says at the same time June says “definitely,” from the passenger seat. 

Alex sighs and holds his wrist across the middle seat so that Nora can see it. He tilts his head down and says, “Henry.”

“Henry what?” June asks from the front seat.

“His soulmate,” Nora says. She chuckles a bit. June frowns for a second before laughing as well.

“Why are neither of you surprised by this?”

“It just,” Nora puts her face in her hand and laughs. “It makes so much fucking sense.”

“It really does,” June agrees.

“HOW?”

Nora turns to Alex and puts her hand on his shoulder, gazing into his eyes concernedly. “He’s gay and you’re hot. Oh and, Alex, babes, you’re in love with Henry.”

The fuck. The weight of that information slams Alex back in his seat. He doesn’t even have time to process the whole ‘Henry being gay’ thing. “What the fuck. No, I’m not.”

“It’s okay, honey.” Nora strokes his hair. “Let the truth sink in.”

“That’s literally fucking insane.” Alex scrunches up his eyes and eyebrows and does a mental replay of the last several years of his life, ever since he first saw Henry’s photo in June’s magazine. 

Okay, yeah, no. He still doesn’t believe it. “Okay, I don’t believe you.”

Nora shakes her head. “You idiot.”

“But,” Alex continues, “what I really want to know is how he’s my soulmate.”

“What do you mean?” June asks, turning to look back at him briefly.

“He’s so bland. And boring. He’s a perfect blank Prince Charming. Plus, he hates me.”

Nora sighs in disapproval at that. “I wouldn’t be so sure.” Alex raises an eyebrow. “Actually, I’m not going to tell you,” Nora adds.

Alex rolls his eyes. “How did someone so incredibly boring become my soulmate?”

“I don’t know, Alex,” June says. “The universe is just like that sometimes.”

Alex decides on one last thing. Before he fully starts to freak out, and his brain starts to crash from the overload of information, he turns to Nora and asks, “How can I get his phone number?”

\--------

Henry receives the first message two days after his brother’s wedding, and the disastrous soulmate incident. 

No one has asked Henry what his spat with Alex was about. Good. He’d like to keep it that way. 

Henry himself has not thought about it too much. He pretty much just decides to ignore it. It’s not going to go anywhere. 

Still, knowing that Alex Claremont-Diaz is his soulmate gives him a bit of comfort, considering the fact that he’s been in love with him since they first met. Things start to make sense now.

Henry is still confused about Alex’s sexuality. He’s sure that Alex is also confused about his sexuality. Generally, there’s just a fuck ton of confusion on both ends of this relationship. 

Henry expects Alex to ignore him. He expects never to hear from him again. He expects Alex to avoid him whenever they’re in the same room, and eventually, after a few years, the soulmark will disappear, and this will all be a weird blip in their lives. Henry will do as he planned, meet a nice girl, and marry her, and no one will question anything.

And so, he’s surprised when he gets the first message.

+1 (202) 382-5601

**i have one question**  
**what the living fuck**

(Henry is confused by this. His first thought is that this is someone who found his phone number and is just texting him to mess with him, but at the same time, Henry is incredibly bored, and so he decides to respond.)

_And who might this be?_

**it’s alex**

(Oh. Henry quickly changes his contact name.)

First Son of a Bitch

_Oh. Hello Alex._

(Henry doesn’t know how to feel about the fact that Alex Claremont-Diaz has suddenly decided to text him. It doesn’t help the gay crisis he’s currently having, but he’s a little curious as to what Alex might want. He hesitantly texts back.)

_To what do I owe the pleasure?_

**why do you text like youre from the 1700s**  
**that’s the opposite of the point of texting**

_I apologize if my texting is not up to your standards._  
_But really, what do you want?_

**i wanna know how**

_How what?_

**how the fuck we’re soulmates**

_Ah. So you’ve accepted it?_

**i will accept it once i understand**  
**thank you very much**

_What’s the issue?_

**you’re so**  
**you**

_Why, yes I am._  
_And what do you mean by this?_

**boring**  
**youre boring**

(Henry scoffs at his phone.)

_I am not boring._

**dude your fucking dog is literally named david**  
**who names a dog that**

_After Bowie._

**so why wouldnt you just name him bowie**

_A man should retain some element of mystery._  
_Shouldn’t he?_

(There’s a hesitant pause before Alex’s reply.)

**sure, prince henry of who cares**

_How would you like me to prove it to you?_  
_That I’m not boring?_

**hmmm**  
**i have an idea**

(Henry is frightened and yet intrigued. He’s also slightly hurt by the fact that Alex assumed he was boring, as you are when the guy you’ve been in love with for several years insults you over text. But he’s mostly interested in what the fuck Alex has up his sleeve. 

The downside is, he won’t be forgetting about the whole soulmate thing anytime soon.)

\--------

They text all the time.

That’s how it starts. 

Alex discovers that Henry is not, in fact, the boring dumb blond he once assumed him to be. There’s a lot to him, actually, and Alex doesn’t quite know how to feel about that.

He learns basic stuff; Henry loves watching the Great British Baking Show, his favorite food is from a falafel stand close to the palace, his sister, Bea, has a cat named Mr. Wobbles, and if he wasn’t a prince, he’d be a writer. 

But he also learns the more obscure stuff, like how much Henry struggled after his father’s death and the impact it had on their whole family. He learns about the struggles Henry has had with his mental illness and the medication he takes.

Alex learns that he likes to steal Bea’s ice cream at 2 in the morning. He likes to send postcards but would settle for email instead. He loves the cheese from a shop in Paris so much that they always have a selection set aside for when he visits. He likes horseback-riding because, though at first, it was mandatory, it became an escape from reality. 

And Alex tells him just as much. He tells him about his weird, fucked up family, and their arguments, and his dad and Leo and his mom. He tells Henry about June, and Nora, and how he doesn’t think he could survive without them. One night, very late, and slightly tipsy, he tells Henry about the magazine. They’re on a phone call when it happens. 

“You know,” Alex starts, “June used to have this magazine when we were kids. And it had a photo of you.”

“Oh? Had we met?”

“No,” Alex says, and laughs. “This was way before. If I had known what you would be like in real life this probably wouldn’t have happened.”

“So what about this magazine?”

“Well, um,” Alex starts, “there was a picture of you inside of it. I was kind of obsessed with that photo.”

Henry makes a slight sound of confusion on the other end. Alex grimaces out of embarrassment. “How so?” Henry asks.

“Like…” Alex fumbles for words. “I would just- just stare at it.”

“Stare at it?”

“For hours. Your hair looked so soft.”

“Well, I can confirm,” Henry says, and shifts around on the other end, “that it is probably just as soft as you were imagining.”

“Fuck off. I’m sure it’s not that soft. You don’t know the depth of my imagination, especially when it comes to hair textures.” Alex isn’t sure what’s happening right now. It’s something strange, something new. But something is definitely happening.

“Whatever you want to tell yourself.”

There’s an awkward pause.

“You know,” Alex begins, “I thought once about prying up the staples in the magazine and taking that page for myself.”

“What stopped you?”

“My fingers aren’t nimble enough. June’s could’ve, she’s got dainty lady fingers.”

“I have been told that I, too, have dainty lady fingers.”

Alex contemplates this. “That’s actually not surprising.” Henry scoffs on the other end. “It seems like a British thing.”

“Well, Bea’s got man-hands. They’re weird.”

There’s yet another awkward pause, probably due to the fact they’ve both just realized they started having an actual conversation about hands. 

“So, er,” Henry starts, “you said I seemed different in real life?”

“Oh, yeah. Very different.”

“What did I seem like? Other than boring. You’ve made that quite clear.” Alex hears Henry shift on the other line and coughs awkwardly.

“Do you really not remember being a prick to me at the diving finals?’

“Er,” Henry says. “Remind me?”

“I came up to you and introduced myself, as normal people do.” Alex takes a sip of whatever he’s drinking; he’s forgotten by this point. “And then you turned to Shaan and said ‘Can you get rid of him?’”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“That.”

“Yes, indeed, that. You shattered my mental image of you.”

“Well, it was probably too perfect anyhow.” Henry sighs on the other line. “I don’t know if this counts for anything, but my dad had died the year before, and I was pretty much a prick to everyone, all the time. At that point of my life, at least.”

“Oh.” Alex feels so stupid. How could he have not remembered? Henry’s dad had died in 2015 of pancreatic cancer. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah. Anyway, it’s not your fault. You have the right to be angry with me.”

There comes another pause. “Well, I should probably go,” Alex says, yawning. “It’s late.”

“Yeah. Maybe you should.” They sit on the phone for a few more silent seconds.

“Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

\--------

“Wait, so it’s a dinner on Friday, and then a charity banquet on Saturday? Hosted by the same organization?’

“Yes,” Shaan tells Henry as they walk through the palace. “Both in California.”

“I hate America,” Henry groans. “Why can’t the states just, I don’t know, be closer together? It’s such a long flight.”

“Yes, I know how you hate the long flights.” Shaan rolls his eyes. “Alex will be there.”

Henry’s pace halts briefly and then starts again. “And that matters…?”

“You two have struck up quite a friendship recently. You’re always texting him. You look like an idiot, smiling at your phone like that.”

“How do you know it’s Alex I’m talking to?” Henry asks, assuming he’s stumped Shaan. 

Shaan’s eyes drift to his left hand briefly. “Inside sources.” It’s Henry’s turn to roll his eyes. “Anyway, Alex and June will be there, and it’s an overnight trip. The organization is paying for everyone’s rooms in a hotel near the venue.”

Henry is a bit surprised to find himself excited at the prospect of seeing Alex in person again. They haven’t seen each other since the disaster at Phillip’s wedding, and even though it will be the height of awkwardness to be in the same vicinity, the idea gives Henry a slight thrill. 

Talking with Alex constantly certainly hasn’t helped him fall out of love. It’s done quite the opposite. Henry knows so much more now; he knows the rich depth and complexity of Alex and all he’s been through. He knows just how funny, smart, witty…. The list goes on and on. The more time Henry spends talking to Alex, the more he realizes why they’re soulmates. He can only hope Alex realizes that too.

Turning back to Shaan, Henry sighs again. “Very good, I suppose. What’s next on the agenda?”

\--------

“A keynote address and a charity banquet?” Alex asks, finding Henry in the crowd. “They’ve got to be overdoing it just a bit. It’s like, we get it, you care about hunger, but some of us have things to do.”

A lot has happened. In the split second before Henry responds, Alex runs through a mental list of these happenings. 

1\. He is currently in the middle of a massive sexuality crisis, as anyone would be when they find out their soulmate is another guy. He’s currently teetering on the edge of bisexuality. He knows he did some things back in high school which would point to him being very-not-straight. He also knows that he may be kind of attracted to Henry. Although maybe that’s just a soulmate thing. Alex is planning to ask Nora, the resident bisexual, about this soon.

2\. Alex knew, once they started talking, that Henry wasn’t boring, but he didn’t think Henry would be this interesting. Or funny. He wants to spend every minute of every day talking to him, learning more about him, discovering his weird quirks and habits, watching the Great British Baking Show with him. He feels the obsession coming back.

3\. He is going to be staying in the same hotel as Henry for two nights. He’s not exactly sure why this part matters so much to him, but it does. It feels like something important is going to happen. 

4\. Henry currently looks handsome. Very handsome. There’s a small part of Alex that kind of wants to pin him up against a wall. Alex is not sure what that’s about. 

All of these things flit across his mind before Henry says, “Come on, you can’t blame the people for trying to solve world hunger. Though I wish it wasn’t in California.”

“Me too,” Alex says, regaining focus. “So many flights. My brain will never recover from the warp of constant jet lag that I’ve fallen into.”

“I guess this is what we must resign ourselves to.” Henry looks at Alex and smiles. It makes Alex feel something. He likes it. Alex notices that everyone is starting to make their way back to their assigned tables, and so he says, “I’ll annoy you later,” and leaves Henry standing as he goes back to his table. June is waiting for him.

Three hours and one keynote address later, Alex can appreciate the eloquence of the speech and the manner in which it was delivered, but he is also currently suppressing a yawn, and would very much like to go to bed, considering that they’re on California time, and it should be 2 am. Instead, it’s 11 pm, and he’s finally allowed to get up from his seat. He grabs June by the arm as she scans the crowd for Pez, and hastily gives his thanks to several unknown people who pass him by before finally, finally leaving the venue and breathing into the cool night air. 

June and Alex arrive back at the hotel just before 12 am, both on the verge of sleep. 

Now, when Alex heard that the organization that hosted the dinner tonight was booking everyone’s rooms, he thought “great” and didn’t think much else. However, one major oversight that Alex has failed to notice, is that only June was originally coming to this event. Alex recalls this particular fact when the woman at the front desk informs him that there is no room under an “Alex Claremont-Diaz.”

“What? That can’t be right.”

“There’s only one for your sister, sir.” Alex rubs his eyes. As he tilts his head back, he notices, out of the corner of his eye, one Prince Henry of Wales grabbing his hotel key from another employee at another front desk. 

Drowsily, Alex says, “Henryyyyyy. Guess what.”

“What, my dearest?” Henry says sarcastically.

“They don’t have a room for me. Only one for June. And she won’t share with me.” June nods a bit. 

Henry turns back to the employee he was just speaking to, and then back to Alex. “My room is supposed to have two beds.”

“What, is that some special upgrade only you royals get?”

“Probably. How hard it is to live my life.” Henry sighs wistfully.

“Yes, very difficult. Is this you proposing that I stay in your room?”

“Well, unless you would like to sleep in the laundry room or find another poor soul willing to take you in, I’d say I’m your best choice.”

“You motherfucking saint,” Alex says, grabbing his luggage and making for the elevator Henry is going into. 

Standing in the elevator with Henry, Alex has a strange moment. He’s not exactly sure what happens at that moment, but he knows that he is here, with Henry, and there is not any place he’d rather be. He’d rather be at home. He’d rather not be jet-lagged. He’d rather not be feeling the impending stomachache from the too-much-food he ate at the dinner, but here, with Henry, everything seems perfect. Just because of him. 

And as the elevator dings, Alex thinks he’s probably not that straight. He thinks he’s almost definitely attracted to Henry. And as he glances down at the words on his wrist, he thinks, “well, shit.”

\--------

When Henry opens the door to his room (that he is now sharing with Alex), he notices a fatal flaw.

There is, indeed, only one bed. 

He thought there would be two, but no. There’s one.

God. What a fucking cliche.

How dare Alex show up like that tonight? Hair all tousled and windswept, tie loose and smile big. So handsome. Fuck Alex for looking that handsome. It was hard not to jump him right then and there.

“There was supposed to be two beds,” Henry says, looking at Alex, who is obviously less than thrilled. 

“Operative being ‘supposed to be,’ I’m assuming?”

“Yes,” Henry agrees. Alex sighs from next to him. He even looks beautiful when he’s annoyed and jetlagged and sleep-deprived. 

“I’ll take the floor,” Alex says. He walks across the room and starts rifling through a closet, obviously looking for a blanket or bedding of some kind. 

“That’s stupid,” Henry says, walking over to the same closet. “I’ll take the floor.”

“No, it’s fine,” Alex insists. “I’ve slept in a lot of weird places.”

Henry is not quite sure how to take that, but he doesn’t question it. “We could just both sleep in the bed.”

“What the fuck. No, we couldn’t.” Alex is very definitive.

“It’s literally a king-size bed. We wouldn’t even breathe right next to each other; king-size beds are enormous.”

“True, but…” Alex trails off. “I’m taking the floor, end of discussion, please stop discussing this now.” Henry reluctantly complies.

They take their turns getting prepared for bed, and then are finally settled in; Henry in the bed, Alex on the floor, lights flipped off, tensions high. Minutes pass. Henry tries to fall asleep. More minutes pass. He hears Alex shift from below. Several more minutes go by. Henry hears Alex sigh from his makeshift bed on the ground. It is obvious that he can’t get to sleep. 

“For Christ, Alex, just sleep in the fucking bed.”

Alex huffs, but then Henry looks over and sees him standing up. He thinks Alex mutters, “Fine.”

Alex shuffles into the bed, and the feeling of having another person lying in the bed with him is odd, but kind of comforting. Henry feels nice when Alex is around him. He feels safe.

After they lie there quietly for several minutes, Alex finally breaks the silence. “This is so weird.”

Henry chuckles. He can’t help but agree. “A bit strange, yeah.” They look at each other and laugh. 

But then, once they’ve finished laughing, Alex seems to get serious again and sighs deeply. “We’re soulmates, aren’t we. Like real, actual soulmates.”

“Yeah.” Henry smiles a little bit. The universe appears to be right this time. “We are.”

Alex laughs nervously. “What are we going to do about that?” Alex turns his head until his eyes lock with Henry’s. The eye contact is strange, but Henry likes it. And then, Henry feels it. 

Henry mutters, “Fuck you,” and then he’s kissing Alex, and oh, oh his lips are so soft, and they fit perfectly, and this feels so completely and utterly right, so fucking correct and cosmically understood that Henry wonders why they haven’t been doing this the whole time. Why would they do anything other than doing this?

Alex is kissing him back, and Henry is glad that he’s kissing him back because it means that he wants this too. Henry has wanted it for so many years and it feels so good and so right and Henry can’t wrap his head around it. He wants more, more, more. 

Alex leans into it a bit more, teeth grazing Henry’s bottom lip and mouth parting to deepen the kiss. His hand snakes into Henry’s hair and pulls on it, and a soft moan escapes from Henry’s lips. Henry cups Alex’s cheek and kisses him like he needs it, like this is the air he’s breathing, like everything makes sense now. 

Alex pulls back slightly, resting their foreheads together. Henry smiles. It’s hard to remember how to breathe.

“Wow,” Henry says.

“Yeah.” Alex laughs. “Wow.”

“The universe was right.”

“Yeah. Maybe it was.”

“I’m glad it was.” Alex matches Henry’s smile. 

“So,” Alex starts, “how the fuck is this going to work?”

**Author's Note:**

> youre a liability~
> 
> pls ignore this it's an inside joke anyway love u liability


End file.
